Monday, August 3, 2009

Return of The New Year's Resolution

People who run are nuts. Why anyone would choose to take their own oxygen away while continuing to chase after it wearing gym teacher shorts is beyond me. They always want to recruit you to do it, too. Have you ever noticed that?

"Oh, don't worry. I'll go slow."

Yeah, right. My husband told me that lie once. While I did my best Doc Holliday impression, he actually turned around and started running backwards next to me, because my humiliation wasn't enough of a workout for him. Poor guy. Hopefully that punch to the gut I gave him made things all better.

So I guess it's fair to say God knew that I was secretly planning on ignoring that New Year's resolution I made about running a 5K this year. While I truly meant it at the time, standing on my bathroom scale, in the previous seven months I've managed to avoid danger, and even a good game of tag. So no running here. But I should have known my luck wouldn't last forever. Just two weeks ago, on my 35th birthday, I learned that the annual Lewis & Clark walk/run, held right here in Weston, has been changed to the Weston Pancreatic Cancer 5K/10K Walk Run.

For those of you who know me, you know that I lost my mom to pancreatic cancer just three years ago. Ever since, I've wanted to do something in her honor, but have bailed at the last minute every time. It's painful to revisit her struggle and my loss, and my natural talent for procrastination has led me to put off even this important task as long as possible.

It's also pretty easy to make excuses when I think about exercising. I don't have time, I might pull something, Diary of a Mad Black Woman is on tv--trust me, I've used them all. But to find out there is an opportunity right outside your door to not only keep your promise, but raise money for one of the most devastating forms of cancer there is, well, even I can't come up with a good reason to wuss out this time.

While that isn't funny at all, seeing me run definitely will be. I hope to see you there, September 12 at 8 a.m.